Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps he is taking to help ensure equal accessibility in education for children from all backgrounds.

Our ambition is for every child, no matter what challenges they face, to have access to a world-class education that sets them up for life.

The government places mandatory requirements on school admission authorities through the School Admissions Code. Its purpose is to ensure that all school places for maintained schools and academies are allocated and offered in an open and fair way. The School Admissions Code requires that admission arrangements do not unfairly disadvantage children from a particular social group. On 1 September 2021, the department introduced a new School Admissions Code which aims to improve the in-year admission of vulnerable children and help reduce to a minimum any time spent out of school.

Looked after and previously looked after children are among the most vulnerable in our society and so all schools are required to give highest priority in their admissions criteria to them. The School Admissions Code also gives admission authorities the freedom to choose to prioritise children eligible for the pupil premium or who have a social or medical need, according to their local circumstances.

Where a pupil is identified as having special educational needs, schools should take action to remove barriers to learning and put effective special educational provision in place. Schools also have a legal duty to produce an accessibility plan that sets out how, over time, they are going to increase access to the curriculum for disabled pupils, improve the physical environment of the school to increase access for disabled pupils, and make written information more accessible to disabled pupils by providing information in a range of different ways.

The department is investing £300 million in the 2021-22 financial year to support local authorities to deliver new places and improve existing provision for pupils with special educational needs and disabilities or who require alternative provision. It is for local authorities to determine how to best use this funding to address their local priorities, such as investment in accessibility to improve or broaden access to existing provision.